The Necessary Part
by VeroniqueClaire
Summary: .'Mademoiselle Daae,' the Persian declared, 'The monster bound you...and he shall unbind you. You have only to play the necessary part! Remember that he loves you' ...A Leroux fill in. Christine is torn between freeing Raoul, and saving Erik.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: Hi all, I'm reposting this chapter after I caught a continuity error (re: which room she was in,) and after a reviewer smartly pointed out some version discrepancies. For the record, it was a sentence in Leroux that inspired this story, and this piece aims to fit into that scene without altering later parts of the novel. My writing style is, however, probably more influenced by Kay. I have used the ALW half-mask, simply because I'd like Erik's emotions to be a little more visible to Christine. Ok, I think that's everything, up with this chapter, and the next one about 3/4s done. --Ver 1/16/2006**

**Original Author's note: Well, it's only taken me four years to get around to writing new Phanfic again. This will probably be a two part story, expect the second chapter later this week. The inspiration for this piece came from the original novel -- certain sentences have always made me wonder where there story could have gone, had they been explored. With apologies to Leroux for slightly editing the excerpt that starts it all. **

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_"Mademoiselle Daae," the Persian declared, "the monster bound you...and he shall unbind you. You have only to play the necessary part! Remember that he loves you!"_

_"Alas!" she replied. "Am I likely to forget it!"_

_"Remember it and smile to him...entreat him...tell him that your bonds hurt you."_

_But Christine Daae said:_

_"Hush!...I hear something in the wall on the lake!...It is he!...Go away! Go away! Go away!"_

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Silence.

Christine leaned forward, her heart flapping frantically, straining to hear, hoping for the sound of Raoul and the Persian fleeing, escaping, something. They had to go away, she wanted all of this to go away, wished she'd never believed in angels, wished she'd never lost her scarf in the sea... and the tears streamed down her face anew and she couldn't even raise her hand to wipe her eyes, and she cried out a defeated, choking, sob.

It echoed, and then there was silence again.

She lowered her head to where her wrist was bound to the arm of the chair, and attempted to dry her face, to lay forehead on forearm and breathe slow and calm her pulse. But the situation didn't go away when she closed her eyes. Erik was coming back. She'd heard him. Heard the footsteps along the lakeshore, he couldn't be far, and he mustn't find them there.

Her mind spiraled despair and fear. He'd been so angry when he left, but it was like infection on the surface of a wound -- it was secondary. She had hurt him. She had thought to just run away and avoid the terrible moment of breaking his heart and in the process she'd done worse. And now Erik was raging and sobbing and oh, he had always hated Raoul. He mustn't know Raoul was there! Raoul, so earnest, he'd followed her down to save her but she wasn't worth saving. She wasn't the happy viscomtesse Raoul thought she'd be, and she didn't deserve Erik's deep, if dark, devotion and didn't know what to do, and she hated herself. And oh, god, Raoul had a pistol. He'd already tried to shoot Erik once, and surely Erik would attack him on sight and one of them might die tonight and all of this, was because of her. It was all her fault.

Christine was going to be ill.

She closed her eyes, willing her stomach not to heave, willing her heart to slow, to stop even, something to escape this confrontation.

The sound of footsteps echoed in the hallway outside the Louis-Philippe room.

She drew her breath in sharply. Slowly, she raised her head and listened.

She could hear each heel to toe noise upon the ground, and the floorboard creak. Erik's steps normally snapped, he walked quickly, but these noises approached in a way that was almost weary. Closer and closer the noises drew, and then... nothing. Christine eyed the door, with nothing to do but wait, and the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to thunder with its slow ticking. The minutes drew out so long, and her head was spinning; no sound but her own teary breathing. Had she dreamt the footsteps coming towards her? Had she imagined Raoul and that Persian man had ventured into Erik's home?

The doorknob turned, and the door swung open.

Erik stood, framed by darkness, no light in the room behind him, his posture stiff. His clothes appeared to be wet -- the white of his dress shirt near-translucent, clinging damply to his skin, and he almost seemed to shiver where he stood.

His eyes met hers, but he seemed to be looking at her, regarding her from a distance, as though she weren't staring desperately back at him.

"Erik?" she asked, weakly.

He closed his eyes.

"Erik? Where did you go? Why are... were you in the lake?"

He opened his eyes and looked at her wearily, and walked into the room.

"I wanted to be alone," he said distractedly, turning his back to her and bending over the fireplace. "I just wanted... I wanted my home to be safe, and to do that, I had to make it a fortress. And that still didn't stop them from looking for me. I don't ask them to look at me! I don't ask for bodies in my lake."

She drew her breath in sharply. He didn't move, and kept talking with a calmness she didn't know whether to attribute to fatigue or some inner clockwork of his methodical brain.

"I wanted nothing, and no one," he continued, picking up wood and fuel from the hearth and adding them to the low burning flames in the fireplace until they blazed tall. The heat chafed her cheeks from even across the room, and still he stood unflinching in front of it, adding more logs to the fire, not looking at her. "And then I wanted you. I didn't even know what it was, I'd never felt -- never known -- I just wanted you here. With me. And now --"

"Erik!" she cried

He looked over his shoulder, and finally seemed to see her. He looked down

"Please," she said, "Please, will you untie me?" She couldn't hear it again. She had to get his mind off of her betrayal, had to get him to untie her, then she could... she didn't know.

"Your forehead does seem to have stopped bleeding," he whipped around and strode towards her, his voice suddenly tinged with a humor that was clear, cold, and cruel. "Were you thinking of giving it another try on the wall over there? Because I'd just as soon leave you tied up and save myself the cleaning. If you're looking for gestures to hurt me, you did far better with your plans to run away with that boy than your ineffective little attempt to off yourself."

The tears slipped down her cheeks -- had they ever stopped? -- and she stared at him in half indignance and whole horror.

"I must admit," he went on, his voice tinged with a sardonic flippancy that was more painful than any of his rages, "that normally saying, 'I would rather die than be with you,' would be rather damaging to a man who wants nothing in this world save yourself. But Christine, really, your methods! If you'll pardon my saying so, death by headache is a rather laughable demise." There was no laughter in his voice.

"Stop..." she said, her voice low and thick in her throat.

"Would you rather talk about your attempt to kill me, then, Christine? A waiting carriage and boy with luggage and a broken promise to _come back and give me an honest answer_."

"Stop..." she said again, her voice rising, wavering.

"...Simple, not terribly well planned, and yet -- I must give you credit Christine. Nothing you've done so far -- not taking off my mask, not plotting with the managers to betray me, none of it has reached that level of cruelty. I've spent decades years being persecuted, and chased and absolutely _hated_, and yet you were able to top all of that, and nearly unconsciously, effortlessly. 'Let's just run away.' Hats off to you, Mademoiselle!"

"Stop!" she cried out, furious at him, at herself.

"I couldn't stop you!" he lashed forward, suddenly looming over her as she leaned back, hurling words like a snake spits venom. "I gave you everything -- I would have done anything -- and I still couldn't keep you from leaving me. From betraying me! Did you think your _boy_ gave any of those gendarmes the order to bring me in alive?"

She couldn't meet his gaze any longer, couldn't dare see his eyes raging . She looked at the floor as the tears slipped noiselessly down her cheeks. Erik stepped backward.

"I almost wish you'd try to deny it," he said quietly.

Her heart, surely it was stopping, twisting, something, the waves of shame and regret slamming her in the chest but all she could do was squint her eyes, couldn't even hide her face, wretched, wretched ropes preventing her. She had to...

She lifted her head and met his gaze and said, weakly, but truly, "I'm sorry."

He made no movement or sound.

Christine sat up taller, and tried to read his regard, but his eyes were as much of a mask as the porcelain. She just... she had to get him to untie her. Then she could... she could free Raoul, let him go somewhere safe, so she could talk to Erik, so she could... so she could explain. Try to explain. If she could even understand, herself.

She hung her head defeatedly, her matted hair falling in front of her eyes.

"Will you please untie me," she said in a low, ragged voice, fully expecting him to deny her again.

But he said nothing, and she raised her eyes to him to find a strange, uneasy expression on the unmasked half of his face.

"What will you do if I untie you?" he said flatly, "Will you try to kill yourself again?"

"No!" she said quickly, too quickly. She took a breath. "I do not wish to die."

"What would you do if I untied you?" he said again, his beautiful voice sounding hollow. "Would you scream? Would you run? Or would you..."

With every word, Christine's vague sense of dread rose, coalesced, and seemed to almost sit physically upon her heart, her lungs, so heavily...

He paused, looking almost nervous, and then spoke quickly. "What would you do, Christine?"

She realized, as her fears fused and became whole, that the situation had lead to where she could do exactly what the Persian man had proposed. That she could... that she could twist his affections for her to get him to unbind her. She could say something gentle and endearing. Or enticing. She could plead in a way to prey on his feelings, and oh, god, she felt ill again. She couldn't. She'd been so terrible to him already. This was all so wretched and wrong and...

He seemed to be looking at something far away, beyond the walls of the small bedroom she'd come to regard as her own.

"I..." she began, her voice wavering.

He continued to look away from her and down, his head bent almost as though he was bracing himself for a blow.

"I would sit, and I would listen," she said in a rush, pushing her heart into her words. "Please, I won't run, and I can try to... to explain. But I can't do it like this," she said, lifting her wrists the half inch the ropes would allow and then letting them fall to the chair again. Her arms stabbed with pain as her wrist bones struck the wood, but she went on,"You say all you wanted was for me to come back and give you an honest answer, but what honesty can I give you when I am bound?"

A long pause, and then he knelt at her feet, his head hanging low. She saw his shoulders rise as a took a deep breath, and then slowly released it. Christine's heart wrenched again, fearing that he wept, but his hands rustled at the cuff of his pants and then he looked up, holding a dagger.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note: A month between updates isn't that bad when you consider my average -- which is something on the order of years. :-) Thanks to all the people who left feedback, I'd be lying if I didn't admit that it's one of my favorite things about writing. I especially appreciate specific feedback (and will strive to start leaving more of it, myself.) This is the second of three parts to this story. The third is half written, and I'm trying to figure out exactly where I'd like it to go (bearing in mind that it can't go too far, in order to rejoin with Leroux.)  
**

* * *

"Be very still," Erik said, and she stifled a gasp as he quickly sliced through the ropes binding each arm without his hands ever touching her. He then seemed to busy himself with re-concealing the blade, as Christine shook her wrists, free at last, and brought her hands together to rub the sore skin.

"Forgive me," he muttered with such sadness that Christine, furious just moments before because he had bound her, found herself nearly accepting his atonement. Rolling her wrists and satisfied that blood was indeed flowing back into them, she moved to stand, and Erik nearly leapt away from her. She froze, halfway standing, and eased herself back into the chair, not wanting to startle him any further, not certain why he was looking at her so warily, almost as though she was a lion who might attack.

Then he turned swiftly on his heel, took one step and paused, his head turned, but not quite looking over his shoulder. "You may stay in your room if you wish to be alone," he said. "But please do not try to leave me."

Without looking back again, he walked stiffly away and closed the door behind him. It clicked shut, and Christine dropped her head into her hands. Her head hurt, her wrists hurt, and she didn't know what to do, didn't know how to free Raoul, didn't know what to do for Erik. She propped her elbows on her knees, resting her eyes on the heels of her hands until she saw stars, and for a moment she wanted to go forward into it, wanted to lean deeper into the dark oblivion to faint, to escape everything she'd done, even if she had to be unconscious to do so. But Erik would not catch her this time, would not carry her... he must have carried her before, all those times when she had become scared or sleepy or lightheaded and slipped into blackness only to wake, fully clothed in her own bed, covered with a blanket, her slippers placed neatly by the door. How gently he must have slipped the shoes from her feet, never once waking her -- but now he laughed coldly when he spoke of her fit of madness, her attempt to bludgeon to death the self she was so tired of.

And yet an hour earlier, he had beseeched her to marry him. She wasn't sure if he loved her or hated her, only that she had hurt him. She had to talk to him. Raoul, he would be safe, just so long as Erik thought the... oh god, he'd called it 'the torture chamber'... so long as Erik thought it unoccupied. She could talk to Erik, calm him, then release Raoul and the Persian man, and then... she shook her head and nearly longed to beat it again, for the momentary respite the pain of each blow had brought her. But then she recalled the look of horror as he'd found her, the simultaneous anger and sadness and ultimate silence as he'd emotionlessly wiped the blood from her face, from her neck and said he supposed there was nothing to be done for the dress.

She could not escape herself.

And just as she began to spiral again, to drown in regret and blame at how she'd caused this situation, she heard a noise from the next room. A cry, a short breath, quickly silenced. That single gasp so sad that Christine stood, no thoughts, no plan and walked towards the door, the ruined wedding gown unfurling as she went, crushed and stained satin trailing behind her. The door to her room wasn't locked, and she didn't know if he'd meant her to follow or simply wished not to detain her but she didn't care and she didn't understand anything and she was tired and terrible and she walked down the hallway to the sitting room.

He was there, sitting in a low, cushioned chair with a carved wooden edge, facing the house's largest fireplace. His back was to her, but he appeared to straighten at the noise of her footstep in the room. Erik said nothing, and yet that noise she'd heard, that stifled sob, it rang in her ears and pierced her heart, and without quite knowing what she was doing she walked the rest of the way across the room to stand behind his chair, and she placed her hands on the top of the chair's back.

If he was sitting still before, he was frozen now.

And Christine Daae was watching her hands slide out, away from each other, along the sloping wooden frame that ran arm to back to arm along the top of the stuffed armchair. Her palms reached further, around to the sides, the arms of the chair, and she noted the smooth texture of the wood beneath her fingertips, the pattern of the chair's brocade fabric, and then she noticed that she was surrounding him with her arms without touching him at all. Her heart was suddenly hammering on the wall of her chest, but still her fingers crept forward, and then Erik turned his head, and both of them were watching her right hand approach his own where it lay in his lap.

It was then she noticed that his left hand was gripping his knee. And she paused for a moment, thinking for the first time about what on earth she was doing, but as the motion of her hands stopped, she saw the hand gripping his knee tense so hard that it trembled, and if she leaned any further forward she would actually be touching him, embracing him, comforting him, and she saw he was still staring at her right hand, just inches from his own.

She exhaled, and fell against him.

His head leaned forward and Erik drew a ragged, shuddering breath, each tremble of his body transferred to her own, pressed against his back, arms on top of his. The movements somehow translated his emotions directly to her, and she reached forward, to grasp his right hand at last, and squeezed it. Another breath, from him, quicker, choked, and he began to draw his arms in across himself, bringing her arm with his, leaning forward and pulling her tighter against him, but then his chest lifted, and he said, low and hoarsely, "No."

Erik threw his arms away from his chest, flinging hers back as well, and he stood, quickly, whirling around, and looking at her with eyes raging. "No!" he said louder. "I -- I can't."

"I don't underst..." Christine faltered.

"I _heard_ you!" he spat, and fainting would have been welcome, but instead she stood, still feeling how his body had shaken in her arms.

"I heard you, talking with them, forming your plan! Again! This is my opera house! Do you think there is anything I do not hear?" He was ranging, his voice thundering all around her. "I knew your young _suitor_ and his friend would be in the torture chamber the instant they descended the trap doors! Christine, tell me, how did you think you could plot against me in my own home without me hearing it?"

She had raised her hands to her mouth as he shouted, so lost, so wishing she could... "I don't know what you mean," came her voice without her thinking to say it.

"I do realize," he said, controlled and seething, "that you have sustained a number of blows to the head tonight. It's an occurrence that I keep trying to forget, and yet I must remember that it's undoubtedly affecting your memory. But surely, Mademoiselle, you must recall the conversation you had just a half hour prior to now, wherein you planned to trick me into releasing you. I heard, when you conspired to lie to me and --" and here his voice cracked, and softened, and he went on. " And to -- to deceive me. To ply me with a kind word, or perhaps --"

She lowered her head, but still he went on.

"Perhaps a gentle touch-- " and his voice trailed, somewhere between wistful and bitter that she rushed to speak, to soothe with words.

"I agreed to none of it!" she cried, pleading. "Did you hear me comply? I heard voices and I told them to go away!"

"Not in words, but you --" and here he seemed to remember, and lifted his hands to his head, sliding fingers from temple to skull, incredulously cradling his head for a moment then returning to her, angry again, "You just touched me. Your... arms, on mine, your hands -- I rather doubt that after months of revulsion you were suddenly inspired this night to embrace a dead man."

"You're not dead, please, don't say that," she said fearfully, mournfully, "You're alive and I am here and we can just... I wasn't trying to deceive you, when I... it wasn't a trick."

"How can I believe you?" he cried, his voice sick with grief. "I heard the plan. I knew you would speak endearingly, speak gently, offer me a little hope, and I --" and here he broke, before her eyes, his perfect voice cracked, his shoulders fell, and when he spoke again his words were horrified, hollow and low with shame, " -- _And I was going to let you_."

"Why didn't you, then?" Christine heard herself say without wanting to, numbly knowing his answer.

"Because I love you." he said, resigned, rubbing his forehead. "You must know that -- must know that was the reason. Why would you ever ask? Do you enjoy making me say it? Does it amuse you to know that you can do all manner of terrible things to me, and yet I love you still?" His eyes narrowed, and he said, coldly but softly, "Most people have the kindness to pity condemned men, Christine."

"I don't understand why you must insist that there is malice in every action I take." she pleaded. "I don't make light of... of your feelings for me, I don't wish to hurt you."

"Then tell me," he replied, tiredly, "what in hell inspired you to -- to -- to do that, " he finally said, gesturing dismissively at the chair where he'd sat moments before, now resting between them.

"I..." she began, but she didn't know, and she felt suddenly very shy. She scarcely knew her feelings, much less had words for them, and the words that came first to her mind scared her. "I thought it's what you wanted," she said lamely, turning to discuss his feelings instead. "I thought you wanted... us... to be close... and you looked so sad, and..."

"I'm sadder now," he said, darkly. "Allow me a moment of unveiled honesty, Christine. If you were to add up all the fleeting moments, and perhaps a few rather enjoyable afternoons -- and a few less enjoyable hours at four in the morning -- if you were to add them all, you would find that I've spent the sum total of entire _days_, perhaps even weeks, thinking about what it would be like to touch you. To -- embrace you, or just to feel your hand upon mine -- or if I was feeling particularly indulgent, I imagined what it would be like if you were ever to lay your head on my chest. As if you were mine." He paced slightly as he talked, not quite ranting, seeming almost to lecture her, in a voice that was dejected, self-deprecating and snappish at once.

"And after all of that wondering, my dear, I came to a few conclusions. I decided that, if you were ever to -- to allow me to show you any affection -- I was certain that you would be warm, and soft. Such simple things, and yet they were a constant in every musing -- I'm sure it indicates some grand psychological flaw on my behalf, the invariable conflation of affection and comfort. It's amusing, really, Christine -- a man of my age ought to be a bit more libidinous! But where was I -- ah yes -- those hours of musing led me to tritely imagine that you would smell somewhat like heaven, and I was somewhat convinced that the very feeling of your skin, touching mine -- if it ever were to happen, I imagined that it might make my damnable heart give up on the spot, from the bliss of such a moment."

"All of those things, Christine, I found to be true just now. But the last thought I had in all those dark lonely hours of writing music or staring at the lake or lying in that wretched coffin touching the ceiling and wishing it were you, the last thought I had was that if you were ever to touch me -- if you were to allow me to touch you -- to be 'close', as you put it, I imagined it would _mean_ something. Maybe not that you felt exactly the same as I felt for you, because at this point I doubt the possibility. But I still believed you could care for me. I believed if you ever allowed me to embrace you, invited it, even, that it might finally mean that you did."

"Do you not believe that now?" she asked quietly as she stood before him, tears silently streaming down her face.

"At the moment, Christine," he raised defeated eyes to meet hers, and said grimly, "I believe I should have spent less time on your vocal studies, and devoted more attention to your acting lessons."


End file.
